Here's a sampling of what Monty had to say after last night's 79-47 victory over the Dolphins. The last quote really stood out to me.
On his thoughts on the way things turned around tonight:
It's about coaching and trying to get better. I think we tried to get them fired up a little bit. I felt like we play hard, which is a big deal for us. If I don't do anything, I shouldn't get paid. They shot 28 percent tonight. One of our goals was trying to get better defensively. I felt like coming out of New York, we were a little wounded. I thought that psychologically we were a little bit unconfident, and I wanted to get them to play hard. I thought they did that and that was a great starting point for us. If I ever get to the point where I'm satisfied with everything, we're either going to win a national championship or we're not worth coaching.
On what Cal could have done better:
We could have done a lot of things better. This is November college basketball. We have a couple of people injured. We have people playing in positions that they've never played before. We have people playing college games that have never played in them before. We're just trying to get better as we go. If they get one offensive rebound, it's too many. They got 17. If they turn the ball over one time, it's too many. We turned it over 13 times. This is an imperfect game and you're always striving to be better. It's a game of mistakes. I'm not trying to be negative. We have a really tough schedule, and we're down a few players so we have to be as good as we can be.
...
On Jacksonville:
Somebody said to me yesterday, "Well you have a cupcake coming in here." I just hate that. You have a bunch of kids trying to compete and they all of a sudden become somebody not worthy. I just can't stand that. It's college kids playing basketball and they're picked to win their league. What I want is our team to play as well as we can play and whatever happens, happens. To get involved with the rollercoaster of whether they are supposed to be any good or not in somebody else's opinion doesn't work for me. And it frankly doesn't work for our basketball team. We have to play hard every game out so that when we're against an opponent in an even game, maybe we can play a little bit harder than they do or maybe we can want it a little bit more.
After the jump we have injury updates (for Syd, Yarnway, and JHill), Harbaugh discussing his regrets from the Big Game, recap/analysis of basketball's win over Jacksonville, and more.
The GN will take tomorrow off, but will return Friday evening. Have a good turkey day and a satisfying black friday! May you all fatten up on turkeys and and then get great deals on TVs, laptops, and whatever else you care to buy.
Cal Football
- After a horrendous start to conference play, Cal is close to finishing second in the conference. Alualu and Brett Johnson cite the team's leadership, chemistry, and positive mindset which allowed them to persevere. Some notes from practice: Syd's ankle injury has kept him out of practice, but he is hoping to return on Sunday. Great news for Dasarte Yarnway: after foot surgery, he is practicing in full capacity in the team's no-contact drills. Tedford says Josh Hill has a shoulder sprain. Whether this will prevent him from playing at Washington has yet to be determined.
- Harbaugh regrets the 4th and 8 attempt to get the first down and the pass plays called for Luck at Cal's 13 yard line. Stanford center Chase Beeler says the 3-man front of Cal's defense disrupted his flow. Because a defender was lined up directly over center, he had to block quicker than normal, which resulted in a few misplaced snaps which Luck fumbled.
- Best falls one more spot on Mel Kiper's Big Board. He's now 20th on the list of top NFL prospects.
Cal Basketball
- An MRI on Theo Robertson's foot revealed no stress fractures, but the pain is preventing him from playing. He is unlikely to return against Princeton on Sunday, but he should not be sidelined long term.
- As always, Farudo's game thread is a good recap of Cal's win over Jacksonville yesterday. Cal cruised to an easy 79-47 victory led by PC's 23 points and 4 steals and Amoke's career high of 15 points and 8 rebounds. SFGate recaps the game. After being blocked 20 times in NY, Cal was blocked only once last night.
- Farudo's morning-after leftover notes mentioned Randle's impressive defense against the Dolphins' top scorer Ben Smith. Smith was held to a miserly 3-13 shooting. Farudo speculates that if Cal wants Theo to heal up, they might sit him until the Kansas game on Dec 22nd. The reasoning behind this is that the team has a thirteen-day break following the Dec 9th matchup against Pacific.
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